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Re: Olive green vs. foliage green...

I've often thought that "kinda-greyish" or "kinda-brownish" would probably be superior to green for camouflage in most environments...after all: deer, rabbits and other animals are not green and they are able to conceal themselves pretty effectively, especially in low light.

By the way, Mel: any chance of including Ranger Green in your collection?

Re: Olive green vs. foliage green...

foliage green matches the Army Combat uniform that is it's advantage. Also, at least for Kifaru proucts, it is a very clean match of fabrics and plastic hardware.

"Never shall innocent blood be shed. Yet the blood of the wicked shall flow like a river. The three shall spread their blackened wings and be the vengeful striking hammer of god...And Shepherds we shall be for thee, my Lord, for thee..."

Re: Olive green vs. foliage green...

Is the Kifaru Foliage Green actually grey or is it greener? Got an Express in Foliage on the way so curious just what I have coming [img]/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/smile.gif[/img]

I bought a Camelbak Talon about a year ago that was a grey color(almost bluish in the right light too) that was similar in shade to a paint job I used to see on Olds/Buicks back in the 80's. About a month ago I bought a Camelbak HAWG in foliage that is noticeably green by itself and very, very green compared to the Talon. Also, I bought a cone of #92 Nylon thread in foliage and it was far greener than the thread on the Talon, but dead on to what the shade of the HAWG was

Either of the packs blend in better in the summer(and the Talon did so year round) than most US produced OD Green stuff(British OD seems to blend in better though.)

Re: Olive green vs. foliage green...

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Dan M</div><div class="ubbcode-body">foliage green matches the Army Combat uniform that is it's advantage. Also, at least for Kifaru proucts, it is a very clean match of fabrics and plastic hardware. </div></div>

Re: Olive green vs. foliage green...

A few thoughts on the subject, synthesized from my own experience and a large variety of sources (print and web):

First, for those who know all of this already, I beg your forbearance and forgiveness.

In the past, there was good evidence that olive drab (in some hue) was the best all around solid color for camouflage. Experience is that it is a good choice for most non-desert (read: temperate or tropical) environments. It may still be the best overall solid color. But it's gone from the US military for the present.

Foliage green is a gray-green from the modern UCP. It's not a perfect match for anywhere, but it's also not a bad match either. My experience is that it reflects a lot of the color around it, and appears more gray in photographs than it does in person. Someone in this thread has already mentioned that because it is US army spec, there is ample cordura, webbing, and furniture that color matches perfectly.

Ranger Green is darker than olive drab or foliage, and is likely superior to either in any dark woodland environment.

Black, long popular in camouflage patterns, has the effect of creating the illusion of depth to the naked human eye. Interestingly, there's not a lot of black out there naturally, and hence it may be a 'wrong' color everywhere outside a peat bog. It also is very identifiable in thermal imaging, which is why it has been disappearing from modern camouflage patterns (including from the original versions of the US army's UCP). Please note: black is in the woodland version of MARPAT.

Any pattern which is pseudo-random (e.g. not tiger stripes) will work better at breaking up a human outline than any solid color. If you break out some construction paper and play around a little bit, you quickly figure out that this is much easier to accomplish with three or four colors than two.

Brown is 'the new black'. Brown is nearly ubiquitous in our world, and is one of the few colors that occurs both in desert and temperate climes. It is almost never the 'wrong' color. This is why the USMC has gone with brown for all of their gear - it will work well in any environment. You'll note that there is a fair amount of brown in multicam.

When I was young, the conventional wisdom was that darker was better. There was a lot of black out there, and a lot of darker colors. More recent experience and studies have suggested that when in doubt, lighter is more likely to blend in than darker. If you look at multicam, it is substantially lighter than any of the previous 'woodland' patterns. I have read (but do not know for certain) that multicam is the product of various research programs, one of which included study of how camouflage in animals keeps humans from seeing them. Multicam has little white spots, which would have horrified almost everyone when I was young, but which in fact work really well. Lighter colors can also reflect the colors around them: this is in part how ASAT works. At present, the conventional wisdom is that lighter might be a little better than darker.

There are a variety of resources on the web to read about camo and how it works.

Hyperstealth is a company that has participated in the development of several camouflage patterns that are presently in use (they are a little controversial).http://www.hyperstealth.com/
Many of hyperstealth's patterns are rich with black as a color.... but you can see that they produce patterns which are well suited to almost any environment.

I remain torn about what color to get an EDC pack in.... Brown vs foliage vs multicam. If the folks at Kifaru wanted to expand their website in a meaningful way, it would be to include photos of their different colors against each other and the more important camo patterns out there....much like Emdom has. Heck, I've even thought of calling and seeing if they would send small swatches of their non-milspec colors (I know what UCP/ACU and multicam are going to look like, but not what foliage or brown or OD).

Junkies please note: the match of the webbing on my recently purchased E&E to its multicam pattern is by far the best from any multicam producer thus far. Given how much PALS webbing some stuff is covered with, this matters.... and I predict that Kifaru may be deluged in the future for gear in that color - which will match multicam very, very nicely.

Re: Olive green vs. foliage green...

XOGA, I believe the focus on darker colours in the past was a result of the Vietnam era -- jungle terrain. I agree, the most versatile colours are medium, neutral tones. Grey-Brown is the most common colour in nature and that is reflected in the coloration of many birds, lizards and mammals. When green is used, it should be of a drab (greyish or brownish) shade so it less noticeable in open or urban terrain...unless your AO is exclusively rain forest.